There has been a widespread popularity of density-based tools that planners around the world use to mobilize land development to extract private profits and public benefits, often with the hope that the former will pay for the latter. In Taiwan planning authorities at all governmental levels grant real estate developers significantly more building density beyond zoning limits, almost rendering FAR (floor area ratio) a development control of little relevance.
TDR: A formula measures the grantable density bonus based on the amount of reserved land (baoliudi) the property developer donates to the city government.
New Taipei City was originally Taipei County in Taiwan and was promoted to special municipal status and renamed as "New Taipei City" on 25 December 2010. In this process, the highest supervisory agency of the Taiwanese central government publicly recognized that planning authorities grant real estate developers significantly more building density beyond zoning limits. In other words, density bonusing has been a critical tool for the government in New Taipei City to boost urban development and capture land value.
The final project relies on dataset provided by the Urban Design Committee of New Taipei City, which contains information about residential construction projects that were granted extra density by different levels of governments in New Taipei City.
Map below illustrates extra density gained from TDR and density bonus in each neighborhood.
Map below illustrates extra density gained from different types of density tools in each neighborhood.
